The Mystery of the Spontaneous Butterfly Tattoo
by Mindy35
Summary: CASKETT. Post-"The Blue Butterfly". Beckett reveals something about her tattoo. Castle wants to know more.


Title: The Mystery of the Spontaneous Butterfly Tattoo

Author: Mindy35

Rating: K+, minor adulty stuff

Disclaimer: Not mine, no money made.

Spoilers: _"Boom!", "Food to Die For", "Last Call", "To Love and Die in L.A.", "An Embarrassment of Bitches", "The Blue Butterfly"._

Pairing: Castle/Beckett

Summary: Post-ep for "The Blue Butterfly" (but only a little to do with the ep). Beckett reveals something about her tattoo. Castle wants to know more.

-x-x-x-

After hearing the end – or the beginning – of Joe and Vera's tale, they head to a little bistro in the area known for its sandwiches and soup and strong, hot coffee. As it is lunch hour, the entryway is crowded with hungry Manhattanite's all with the same idea. The snippy head waiter takes their name but informs them that they will need to wait for a table to become available. Castle nearly suggests that Beckett flash her badge and see if her influence might get them seated a little quicker. But he holds his tongue, instead guiding her with a hand on her back to a corner of free space. After all, they are not in any rush, their case has been resolved. And really, huddling with Kate Beckett, their bodies hovering closer than would ordinarily be appropriate, is hardly the worst way to spend a few minutes of his day.

She's been mostly silent since they left Joe and Vera's apartment, a pensive, wistful expression on her face. Her expression takes on a note of confusion though when she tilts her head at him and asks:

"You wanna hear something odd?"

Castle shrugs and replies, "It's what I live for."

Beckett shuffles to face him in what little space they have to themselves. "When I was sixteen, I went to this tattoo parlor with my friend, Maddie, who I'm sure you'll recall."

"Blonde who thought you had the hots for me," he supplies with a nod.

She shoots him a look of mild annoyance. "You would remember that."

He holds up a hand. "Hey, she said it. I just choose to believe it."

Beckett gives a little huff but continues on. "See, we both had a crush on the same guy – which did not work out well for me in the end."

"I know. She told me."

"She _told_ you that?"

"She also told me that you once dressed up as Cindy Lauper for a Halloween party and sang _'Girls Just Wanna Have Fun_' on top of a pool table. Stone cold sober too. Unfortunately, she didn't provide photographic proof. But please–" he waves a hand, clears his throat, "continue with your tattoo anecdote, I'm very intrigued."

"Well…" Beckett takes a moment to frown at him, then shakes her head and presses on. "Somehow, Maddie had gotten it into her head that getting a tattoo would impress this guy we liked—"

"Brent Edwards," Castle fills in without batting an eyelid.

She stalls again, face painted with mystification. "_How_ do you remember that?"

Castle smiles a smug little smile. "Oh, I relish every layer of the Beckett onion I can possibly unpeel." His smile fades and tone turns gradually bitter as he adds, "Even the ones that involve former crushes on slack-jawed punk-rock wannabes with an addiction to hair gel – _and_, I might add, an arrest record as long as my arm."

Beckett crosses her arms between them, her elbows brushing his chest. "Castle, how many times have I told you that police resources are not there to serve your own personal vendettas?"

"Trust me," he grumbles, jaw twitching with barely restrained distaste, "the guy's an undeserving jerk. Your fragile teenage heart was better off."

Beckett can't help a soft snort. "Please tell me you are not actually jealous of a seventeen-year-old I barely knew more than a decade before we even met."

"Wait a second—" His eyes cut to her face, scrutinizing her a moment. "Your tattoo – it's not of _him_, is it? Of his smug pubescent face? It's not his initials or the name of his lame rock band, is it?"

"Just how deep did you dig into this guy?" she asks, scrutinizing him right back. Arms still folded, she leans a little closer to emphasize, "This guy who has absolutely no bearing on my current life and who I could not pick out of a line-up now even if I tried?"

Castle rolls his lips inward, brows climbing towards his hairline. "Never mind. It's…not relevant. You were saying?"

Beckett leans back again, darting him a suspicious look, but letting the point drop with a shrug. "Well, anyway, Maddie chickened out, she couldn't go through with it. But…you know how in those places they have all the different designs up on the walls?"

"Mm-hm…" Castle dips his head encouragingly, rapt by her every word.

She draws in a breath, eyes drifting to one side and voice softening. "Well, I saw this little butterfly design down in one corner and I was just drawn to it for some reason. So, I…"

Castle is silent a moment, the corners of his mouth curving up. "Your tattoo is a butterfly?"

"Does that strike you as a bit strange?" she asks, meeting his eyes and knitting her brows. "I mean, considering this case?"

"Not really," he muses, scratching his jaw. "Not unless it's a _blue _butterfly, that'd be fairly odd." He straightens slightly, eyes twinkling as if something just occurred to him. "And not unless _you_ were picturing _yourself _as the glamorous gangster's moll modelling The Blue Butterfly and me as the dashing PI who fell for her on sight and risked life and limb to have her."

For a second, Beckett's eyes go wide, her mouth dropping open. She makes her recovery quickly though, replying in an almost convincing tone, "Well, if I was, it was only because you put the idea in my head."

Castle smirks, not buying it for a second. "Hm. A likely story." But he moves on, not lingering in territory neither of them is quite ready to delve into. "So, your tattoo. Is it blue then? Does it look like the necklace? How big is it? Did it hurt when you got it done? And if so, was it a bad hurt or the good kind?"

"I'm not answering that question," Beckett mutters, showing him her back as some space opens up behind them.

Castle follows her deeper into the corner. "Which one?"

"All of them."

"Not even whether it's blue?"

"Oh, Castle," she murmurs in an intentionally muted voice, "why ruin the surprise?"

He lifts a brow at her. "I'm sorry, what was that?"

She turns round, putting her back against the wall to continue their wait. "What? Nothing. Not a thing."

Castle shoves his hands in his pockets, rocking on his heels for a moment. "So can I see it?"

She gives him an incredulous smile. "If I'm not going to answer your questions about it, what makes you think I'm going to show it to you?"

"Worth a shot," he shrugs. Then asks another moment later, "So…can I?"

Beckett rolls her eyes but can't seem to stem her smile. "It's not in a place I can really show you, Castle. Particularly not in public."

This only makes his eyes light up with heightened curiosity. "Where is it? Come on, give me a clue."

"No," she mutters under her breath, "if I give you something, you'll never stop."

"Too late, I'm already started."

"Castle—"

"So, I know it's not on your back," he muses, eyes skating over her from head to foot.

"How do you know that?" she interjects, frowning.

"I've seen your back," he tells her simply and utterly unapologetically. "From the nape of your neck to the dint of your butt. Granted, it was covered in soot and ash at the time, but I think a tattoo would still have been visible."

Her mouth tenses into a tight little bud before she whacks his arm with one hand. "_You_ were not supposed to look. You were meant to turn around, Castle."

"Hey–!" He pulls back from her, looking wounded and indignant and nearly tripping over the woman behind him. After muttering an apology, he faces her, stabs two thumbs at himself. "This guy? Rescuing you – remember? I couldn't help but see _something_! – _before_ I turned around. It was hardly intentional. And you can't really blame a guy for having eyes – or…" he pauses to allow a furtive smirk, "excellent recall."

Beckett lowers her voice to a haughty hiss, eyes darting about them. "Can we not publicly discuss me being naked please?"

"Absolutely. But…just to be clear—"

"Nooo," she pre-empts him with a resigned sigh, "we can't discuss me being naked in private either."

Castle nods obediently. "All I wanted to know. Moving along then—"

"Augh, must we?"

"I also know your tattoo isn't on either one of your arms or legs."

"Oh really?" she muses, folding her hands behind her back. "And how do you know that?"

Castle shuffles a step closer under the pretense of doing so to give an elderly couple more room. "Have you forgotten that little poolside show you put on in L.A.? Or did you just think that I would? Because believe me, Beckett, I won't forget that. Ever. It would take a full lobotomy to rid my brain of the image of you coming out of that pool."

She gives an apathetic shrug, her eyes skating briefly round the bustling bistro before landing on his. "I guess I just assumed your mind was focused on the case, not on scanning my flesh for identifying marks."

"My mind _was_ on the case," he tells her firmly. "My eyes, however…"

"Have a mind of their own, I know. So I've noticed."

"So–!" he persists with his trademark single-mindedness, "eliminating these areas, lovely as they undoubtedly are, there aren't many more places for a little blue butterfly to hide." He lets out a sudden gasp, one hand flying up to cover his mouth. "Oh my God…is it on your butt? Beckett, do you have a butt butterfly?"

Beckett's lips purse, suppressing reluctant laughter. She shakes her head at him instead, asking with a bewildered shrug, "Tell me, Castle, do you just lie awake at night thinking about this stuff?"

"Frequently," he answers in a low, resolute voice.

"Well, let it go," she tells him, giving his lapel a little pat. "Because I am not gonna spill and I don't like seeing a grown man beg. It's never an attractive sight." She pushes away from the wall, rising on her toes to peer over the crowd and gauge their progress in the queue.

Castle is not so ready to let the topic drop. "Would begging work though? I mean, if I made it really convincing?"

"It would not," she says, side-stepping his rather significant bulk to get a better view.

"At least tell me this," he says, following her in a mini circle, "why a butterfly?"

"I dunno, Castle," she sighs, heading back to her spot against the wall, "I was a kid. I…thought it was pretty, I thought it would look sexy."

"Dare say it does," he mutters behind her back.

She turns to face him. "Sorry?"

Castle doesn't answer. He just asks: "So do you regret getting it?"

She shakes her head tightly, falling back against the wall with a small thud. "I make it a point of principle never to regret anything."

Castle smiles to himself, then murmurs, "Not even that earlier comment about ruining the surprise?"

She meets his gaze, her eyes narrowing as her head slowly tilts to one side.

"Yes," he answers her silent question, "I heard it."

Beckett considers him a moment, her tongue venturing out to swipe over her lower lip before drawing it between her teeth for a good long bite. Then she takes a breath, stands upright. "Gimme your hand."

Castle looks confused. "What?"

"Your hand," she repeats. "Give it to me."

He hesitates, still looking confused – then slowly lifts his left hand and extends it towards her, palm up.

Her eyes flick down to it then up again. "The other one."

He offers his other hand, which she takes with her own, slowly but deliberately guiding it inside the opening of her jacket. She places his palm on her waist then slides it down until it's cupping her hip.

Castle gulps, watching what she's doing with wide, unblinking eyes. "What's…happening?"

"Feel that?" she murmurs, her voice barely audible above the minor din of the bistro. With her hand covering his, she nudges his thumb in a bit and down a bit, so that it's resting low in the inward dip of her hipbone. "Feel where your thumb is?"

"Uh huh…" he breathes, eyes lifting to hers.

She smiles at him, lets the silence stretch a moment, lets everything around them fade away in the wake of this moment she is allowing herself to create. She presses her thumb over his. "That's where it is. Right there, right under your thumb."

"Right here?" he murmurs, eyes skating back down to her hip, to his hand inside her jacket and her smaller, cooler hand covering his. "I'm touching it? Well, not touching…it, I'm touching…you, your…Wow, that's…"

Beckett smirks slightly, her hand sliding up to rest on his wrist. "What's the matter, Castle? Something making your heart quicken?"

"No, I just…"

His eyes don't leave that spot, the spot she guided him to, that spot on her hip that his thumb has started to circle very slightly, very cautiously. Memorizing that particular location, but not daring to explore beyond it. The tiny touch, even muted by the fabric of her clothes, causes Beckett's blood to rush. It reminds her of how the same thumb stroking her hand just a week or so prior, in a way that for anyone else would have been completely innocent, had evoked such incredibly erotic images in her imagination that she was kept awake for nights afterward. Images of his expert fingers circling her elsewhere, of his large hands exploring her hungry flesh had haunted her dreams and made her crave the kind of affect she did not doubt for a second he could produce in her.

And that was just her hand. This is…not her hand.

"Just…what?" she murmurs, attempting to keep her voice from wavering, reminding herself that while no one is paying attention to them, they are in public.

"Just, ah…" Castle is even less aware of their surroundings and certainly less able to hide the affect this is having him. "It's a very good place," he finishes eventually, his voice sounding thin and strangled. "For a tattoo. A nice spot. For a butterfly." He looks up, cocking one eyebrow. "Especially a blue one."

She smiles, gaze locked with his. "I never said it was blue."

"You never said it wasn't," he retaliates with a warm grin. "And why else would you bring it up?"

"Be a hell of a coincidence if it was, right?"

"Coincidence? Or Fate?"

"I don't believe in fate."

"I don't believe in coincidence."

"I think you've mentioned that. A few dozen times."

"You know what I think?" he murmurs, boldly stepping closer. "I think that you walking into that tattoo parlor all those years ago and seeing that design was an act of fate. Just as you walking into my book party four years ago was fate. I think we were fated to find each other, fated to find that diary, fated to find The Blue Butterfly. Just as Joe and Vera were fated to meet and fall in love and spend their lives together. They knew it the moment they clapped eyes on each other. Some people are just meant to be together. Some people are meant to share their deepest and darkest secrets with each other. They are fated to know each other – every single, intimate, juicy little detail, no matter how deep in the past it may be buried."

Beckett regards him a moment, trying her best not to appear swayed by his words, let alone charmed by his effortless way with them. She breaks eye contact, gives a short nod. "Nice try, Castle. Very romantic and very nicely put. But some things – by which I mean further details about my teen-inspired tattoo – are meant to remain a mystery."

"But I'm very good at solving mysteries. I enjoy uncovering…" his eyes slide downwards as his thumb continues stroking her hip, "…hidden treasures."

"I'm aware of that." Beckett hesitates, taking a breath before telling him in a subtext-laced tone, "And I will admit that our case solve rate has improved solidly over the last few years."

"So…"

"So, odds are…"

"I will one day solve the mystery of the spontaneous butterfly tattoo?" he finishes for her, an expectant smile on his lips and wicked glint in his eyes.

Beckett returns his smile but doesn't answer, letting him read whatever confirmation may appear in her eyes. They are still grinning goofily at each other when the snippy waiter arrives at their side to announce:

"Augh. There you are. We have a table for you now."

Beckett's eyes immediately drop. She gives the waiter a nod. "Thanks. We'll be right there." She waits until the little man squeezes his way back through the crowd before turning to her partner who hasn't registered the other man's arrival or retreat. "Castle."

"Yes?" he answers, eyes wide and questioning.

"Our table," she says.

"Yeah?"

"It's ready."

"Oh, good, I'm really hungry," he says without making the slightest move to leave their little corner.

"Me too," she says and lets her hand drop from his arm. "So…you should probably…"

He blinks his blue eyes at her. "…What?"

She glances down at his hand, still resting contentedly on her hip. "You can let go now, Castle."

"Of course," he answers, looking down too and giving a nervous chuckle. "I didn't realize I was still—"

"You are."

"So I am."

A moment passes in which they both wait for the hand inside her blazer to excuse itself.

It doesn't.

"And you still are," she points out after a beat.

"Yeah…" Castle bobs his head a few times. "I guess I should let go now."

She shrugs a shoulder. "You know, whenever you're ready."

"Okay..." His head bobs some more. His hand doesn't move an inch.

"Castle," she prompts, her voice sharpening somewhat. "We'll lose the table if we don't..."

"Yeah. You're right." He sighs regretfully, examining the offending hand as if it is a disembodied entity he has little control over. "Okay. Removing hand…now." His hand slides way, his fingers dusting lightly over her hip once before finally retracting. Castle peers at his hand, a brief, inscrutable expression passing across his face. Then shaking off any residual sensation, he smiles and holds out the recently affected hand, arm stretched in the direction of their table. "After you."

Beckett ducks her head as she passes, feels his body loitering right behind hers as they are led through the crush to a tiny table where they take their seats and immediately begin scanning the gigantic plastic menu. She is halfway through the salad options when Castle lowers his menu and folds his hands together on top of it.

"Hey…Beckett?"

She glances over her menu at him. "Yes, Castle?"

He is silent a moment. Then he scoots his chair as close to the table as he can get, asking with a careful, quizzical lilt to his tone, "If it _was_ blue, hypothetically…what _shade_ of blue would it be? Like an aquamarine? Or a cerulean? Or a deep, royal blue?"

Beckett hides her smile behind her menu and keeps on reading.

Despite her reticence, for the duration of their meal, Castle makes a game out of naming every single variation of blue he can possibly think of, spotting any and all hues of it in their vicinity. All in the hope that one might spark something in her face and expose one more puzzle piece in the ongoing mystery that is Kate Beckett. A mystery that had held him in thrall for four fascinating years. A mystery that – if he's very, very lucky – may just keep Rick Castle enthralled for the rest of his life.

_END_.


End file.
